


Missing Clouds from a Fifth Sun

by fresne



Category: Meso-American Religions & Oral Traditions, Original Work
Genre: Cat2, Excerpts from Original Work, Gen, Historical AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-11
Updated: 2014-01-15
Packaged: 2018-01-08 09:30:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 44
Words: 14,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1130993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fresne/pseuds/fresne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In an alternative European renaissance, where princes keep vampires as servants, the British Isle has been split into two kingdoms. In the South, Queen Mary rules an England in turmoil. Fearful for her unborn child, she increasingly obeys the whispers of the stone mirror on her wall. While in the North, Queen Elizabeth juggles suitors, the undead and preventing the apocalypse. Each night, Elizabeth dreams of the end of the world. Dreams she shares with four people scattered across Europe: a psychic lost in the present, an undead Crusader, an Aztec priestess and a teenage vampire. Elizabeth struggles to understand how she can save a world that's shaking itself apart.</p><p>This isn't about them. This is about all the people on the sidelines.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Tzitzimime --- Sky --- 9 billion years old

**Author's Note:**

> You may be looking at this and thinking, what the heck is this. So... in 2006 I started writing a Fanged four fic, which evolved into 200k of a book, which got these bits edited out. 
> 
> If after reading my fiction here, you would like to read more about me and my writing check out my profile.

The Celestial Spheres that surrounded the earth turned slowly in measured beats. Like majestic tops whirled by an unseen hand.

The Tzitzimime lived in the spaces between the spheres. Spent ageless lives staring down at the plump pearl of the planet below. Separated only by the music and light of the turning spheres.

The spheres were not solid. There were spaces. The Tzitzimime could have slipped through the spaces. Some had. Long ago. While others had been cut in half when the spheres spun those spaces closed.

None of them had tried in a very long time.

Instead they stared down at the earth with hunger-filled eyes.

One particular Tzitzimime stared at the earth. It had had a name once. The Tzitzimime could not remember it, but that was not important. What was important was that the spheres were slowing down.

It remembered what it meant for the spheres to slow down. It remembered the third sun, or so it had been called by the Tzitzimime’s mother before they killed her. When the world was void and only darkness lay on the deep. No solid spheres then. Only feasting.

So it watched the round world with wide disk eyes. Like black plates lacquered with the harshest varnish. Empty. Longing with its siblings for the banquet.

It spread itself out in wildest longing across the solid cold keeping it from what its eyes emptied on.

Then, there, with an outspread tendril, it found an empty space between the lights. Called to it siblings. Caressed the edges. Wondered if it dared. The spheres were moving so slowly now. Listened to the progression grinding down to a pause. Heard its siblings all around laughing.

It slipped through the space between the spheres to fall like a star towards the glistening sphere below.


	2. Henri --- Villa Fiori --- Hours

Henri hated her. She wasn’t at all like she was supposed to be.

Itz was supposed to be his vampire. She thought Henri was stupid. But he wasn’t.

Henri looked at his tutor, Master Fenris. He stank of mint to cover the smell of liquor. Henri said, “Master Fenris, I need to use the privy.”

Master Fenris shook his head. “Well, go then, Your Eminence.” He smirked at Henri. Smirked!

Henri said, “Yes, sir.” Master Fenris thought he was somebody, but he was nobody. None of them were. He was going to show them.

Henri slipped into Itz’s empty room. He looked through the rows of dresses until he found the red dress. The one she’d worn yesterday. Itz was the stupid one. Just because she’d killed someone in front of him, she thought she was so important. But she wasn’t.

Yesterday, he’d heard Itz talk all about the Pope’s favorite, Cardinal Innocenzo, who wasn’t even that much older than him, so it should be easy to become his friend.

He pulled her dress over his head. He shoved scarves in the bodice. She didn’t have much chest either. Probably because she was a savage from the New World. He wondered what New Spain was like. Then he remembered that he hated her.

He put on her scarfy sun hat.

He tried to sweep down the stairs like he was Itz. Said, “Bring me my litter” to the footman, and he did it. Henri climbed in.

The litter swayed down the street. Henri laughed. He’d meet Cardinal Innocenzo first and make friends with him, and then he’d show Itz who was stupid.


	3. Earth --- Tambrace Manor --- Stolen hours

The master was in his hall lifting a goblet to toast a newly wedded couple. The cook was in her kitchen finishing a wonderfully sour pastry in the shape of a rooster to symbolize the dawn of new love. The stablemen, except one, were in the stables tending the guests’ horses. The maids, except one, were bustling about their tasks preparing beds for the wedding guests.

The other stableman and maid were in the cellar at their tryst. They felt wild and wicked to be meeting unwed. The maid had a secret; she had a bun in her oven. The stableman had a secret; he was in love.

Below the manor, below the cellar with its lovers, there was a cave. It had a secret too. Hidden in a glistening pillar hundreds of feet high born from thousands of years of dripping limestone.

Below the cave there was a crack, a long thin crack in the crust that went all the way down. Below the crust, hot magma moved as relentless as the lovers far above to its release. The crack slid an inch north in one direction and south an inch in the other, and the earth gave way its secret and—

There was a flash and a light and the lovers screamed their sweet release, and then were gone in a flash. The wedding guests above screamed as the earth shook. Then screamed some more as green ooze bubbled from the floor beneath their feet.


	4. Five --- Betsy --- Tambrace Manor --- Stolen hours

The door to the cellar was closed, but wasn’t locked. 

She shivered in the draft and held Ned close. The wood crate beneath her was uncomfortable, but it didn’t matter. She had her Ned and he loved her. 

Course, soon she might have to tell him. Her courses hadn’t come for months. Might not mean nothing. Never heard of hair coming out in clumps meaning there was a bun in the oven. 

Ned whispered, “Cold,” and she could feel the goose bumps on his bare back.

Betsy ran her hands over his chest. Not a bit of hair. Betsy wrapped her arms and legs around her boy, and it seemed like he had a bit less hair down there, but then he put his jiggly bit in her and she wasn’t thinking any more. 

She felt like she was the ocean and Ned was a little ship bobbing up and down on her waves. “Hurry,” she said and she moved her hips to meet Ned’s motion. Squeezed her eyes shut, and the waves crashed inside her, while he let go. Felt like it would go on forever. 

Never did. 

Then she was just Betsy again, lying under her Ned.

The draft was freezing. Ned was feeling it too. He slipped out of her. Time to get back to their duties upstairs.

She dressed quickly. Pausing for fast kisses and whispered, “Love you.” Her eyes were all on Ned in the dark and not at all for the flickering candle. 

She never wondered why there was a draft in a closed room.


	5. Four --- Maia --- The Palace of Nacre --- 346 Year of Pearl

Brown kelp fronds waved gently in the currents of the water. The mer ignored them, they had more important concerns. 

Cracks had begun to form in the pearl roots of the palace. Earthquakes shook gleaming spires from towers. The song of the sea, which first echoed at the dawn of the Fifth Sun, faded more each day. Until even King Triton, barnacles in his beard, his scales gray with age, recited the old lays and admitted that it was time.

Maia was a long time past ready.

King Triton smeared blue ambergris across the birthmark on Maia's forehead. She remembered when Triton was just a little trout squirting around the palace. Now he was old, which made Maia older than old.

Just the person you wanted to send on a quest around the world. She'd daydreamed of the adventures she'd have when she was a little trout. Expected the prophesied signs to happen after she returned from her first journey into the deeper sea. Dreaded them when she spawned her little ones, so small and fragile. Dead now. She'd all but forgotten about it by the time she'd outlived her children's children.

She muttered, "Better get on with it before I get any older." King Triton, who she'd known every day of his life, wept coral tears and handed her the sacred shard, which had once been part of something else, long ago, in another age. He always had been soft in the heart.

The edges of the stone were sharp and cold. She told herself that the stone was a lot older than her, which meant to the stone that she was just a young thing. Practically a girl.

She felt tired already. Her forehead itched with whale grease as she swam from the city of her youth and age and into the open sea to meet her destiny. She wondered if her destiny included a cure for arthritis.


	6. Five --- Amir --- Astrakhan --- Third Watch

Amir huddled on the rampart and turned his rat on the stake. 

“This one’s pretty plump," said Hassan. He warmed his hands on the fire against the night air. Hassan looked over the wall at the sea of camp fires surrounding the city. "Do you suppose it’s true what they say about the Czar?"

Amir cut a piece of flesh from the rat and handed it to Hassan. He said, "And what do they say today?"

Hassan chewed on the burnt flesh for a moment. He stared at the flickering lights of the Czar’s army and said, "They say that he built a giant skillet. That he cooked Jews in it and then he served them in a great banquet to all his princes."

Amir chewed on the thigh of the rat. He said, "I thought that was what you said about that prince from England, the one with the lion heart."

"Eh," said Hassan, "these Christians, perhaps they like the taste of human flesh. 

Amir handed Hassan another bit of meat. Amir sucked at the fat on his fingers. "Eat your rat. Tomorrow we may dine with Allah."

"You think we’ll get a thousand virgins in Paradise if we die defending this stinking wall?" asked Hassan, as he stared at his empty fingers.

"Pft, who wants a thousand virgins," said Amir. "I want my wife to feed me pheasant." 

"No, no, sweetened dates," said Hassan.

"You and your fruit. I want meat," said Amir. "Lamb. Beef."

"Rat…"

"Ha." Amir pulled the last bit of meat from the tiny corpse. "You get some sleep. I’ll kick you if anything happens."

Hassan grinned. "Eh, tomorrow comes soon enough. Let me see if I can go catch another rat.


	7. Guillaume --- Dark Wood --- Day and Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A digression for one of main characters that I cut out of the plot. The Good Knight (i.e. Badass Eyore the Vampire) goes to a Kobold cave.

It was easier to wear his armor than carry it, so Guillaume walked through the dark wood in full plate armor. 

He clanked.

Here below the clouds and trees, Guillaume cast no shadow in the dim light. But then he wouldn't. That would take a soul.

When he was tired, he bedded down under the fallen leaves. Sword in his hand, encased in armor, covered in mulch. When he had a few moments of sleep, he walked down the dusty road. Day and night.

In the forest there was no time. Only his master behind him, and the memory of a Kobold cave in the mountain passes ahead.

He'd be there soon enough. But still, Guillaume didn't like timeless. He kicked a rock against a tree and it disappeared in the underbrush. There was far too much time as it was.

The wind whispered in the ferns. Bluebells danced coyly. New leaves spiraled off branches and into the underbrush. A crow flew over head, a dark shape against dark trees.

Guillaume walked down the dark dusty road. He said, "Half way through the journey of our lives, I came to myself in a dark wood, the true way lost." His words didn't echo. They hardly ruffled the leaves. "Halfway." He shook his head. "Lost alright."

Guillaume kicked another rock.

“Crabbed and cankered flapwits, but this forest goes on forever. I'd think fey and djinn were leading me in circles, but they aren't.” Guillaume bent down and picked up a rock. "This is a different rock that I've never seen before." He threw it at a moss covered grandfather tree. "And that a different tree." The tree made a hollow echo, but did not notice him. "Like and unlike every other rock and tree through this whole infinite forest." 

He looked up at the tree branched sky. "I suppose a horse would be asking too much." The branches creaked in the wind. "Thought so."

Guillaume kept walking. He ignored a rock, stepped over a rut in the road, tripped on a tree root and kicked another rock.

Then in the distance, there was a heartbeat like pounding on the hard high road. "Ha," said Guillaume. "Once I would have thought that was an answer to my prayers."

He bent down and picked up a rock. Tossed it once and caught it. "But who would want a God that would answer my prayers." Tossed the rock again. The sound of hoof beats grew stronger. He climbed a little ridge by the side of the road and waited. Listened to some poor poxy unsuspecting sod ride down the road.

Finally, a horse and rider came fast into view.

Guillaume threw his rock. The rider crumpled forward and slid from the shying horse. The horse's mouth was wet with foam and blood. Its sides were lathered with sweat.

“Shhh… shhhh. Hey there, pretty,” said Guillaume, walking slowly toward the horse. He didn't want to spook it. “Now you’re a pretty bit of feet. Yeah, the wicked man is going to die, and the wickeder man’s come to ride you. Shhhh... ” The horse shifted and pranced and came to a halt. Guillaume rubbed the velvet of her face, “Shhh.”

The mare snorted, blowing hot air in Guillaume’s face. He snorted back. She ducked her head and Guillaume took her reins and tied her to a sapling. After running so fast, she should be walked, but it had been weeks since Guillaume had fed.

Guillaume looked down at the rider. Saw the heat streaming away. Heard the last faint beats of a heart. He knelt to warm his hands by the boy’s fading warmth. He lifted the broken rider in his arms. The rider’s head fell back like a doll. A boy’s pale neck and beardless cheeks and cracked skull. 

Guillaume was hungry. Empty and cold. There wasn't much time now before there'd be nothing left to eat. He carried the rider off the road, as easily as a parent carries a child, up onto the ridge. Away from the horse. Didn't want to spook her too much. Then he bit into the boy's neck, sharp teeth tearing at the skin. Guillaume drank. Deep gulps from a fading heartbeat. Consumed the last of the boy’s warmth and the memory of his life. He drank the boy’s first kiss. He drank the face of the boy’s mother when she smiled, when she died of the pox. He drank the boy’s first beer and his last desperate swyve. He drank all the boy had, as he had with so many before him, until there was no more warmth left to drink. 

Made a man feel disgusting enough to want to scrape off his own skin, except the really vile parts were deep inside. Except he wasn't a man. He was a cancerous thing in a man's skin. 

Guillaume lowered the cold body gently to the ground and said, "See what comes of answered prayers." The boy's eyes stared back at him. Guillaume closed them. Walked back to the road.

The horse nickered at him. “Well, my beauty,” he said, “let’s see what was so all fired important.” He opened a saddle bag. It was full of papers. Guillaume flipped through them one by one. “Russ in the East. Turks in the South. Gog. Magog. Seems like I’ve heard this song before. ‘The noble race of Franks must come to the aid their fellow Christians in the East. The infidel Turks are advancing into the heart of Eastern Christendom. Let none hesitate; Deus vult.’ Seems God wills quite a few things.”

Guillaume let the papers fall to the ground one by one. They drifted in the breeze. 

The breeze blew the papers in a whirl. A crow glided over them. It landed on the dead man and tilted its head. It fluffed its feathers and called to its friends. 

The birds didn’t look at the papers. They didn’t care about Gog Magog, and neither did the dead man lying in the cold dark wood.

That was the dead for you.

Unless the dead was patting a horse’s head and scratching her behind her ears. 

"Seems like you need a name. What’s your name sweetheart? The horse nudged Guillaume and lipped at his face. Breathed hot air in his ear. Guillaume wrapped his metal arms around the horse’s neck and breathed in hot scent. Felt the blood pounding through her veins. She pawed the earth and shuddered.

He said, “Yeah, I know, you shouldn’t be standing still after running so hard.” He picked through the saddle bags for anything useful. Not much. Good. He'd needed to lighten the load if the pretty lady was going to carry a knight in armor. He said, “Seems when I was a boy, not much older than your previous owner, I had a horse about your color and with your same wicked eyes.” The horse snorted. “Yeah, wicked eyes. I bet you lead all the stallions a pretty chase. Just like she did. So, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll call you Sparkita.” She snorted again, “Funny name I know, but my mother's brother named her.” He swung into the saddle.

The world always had a different view from up here. He said, “Come on, Sparkita. Let’s see how you do at a more reasonable pace,” and he clicked Sparkita into a brisk walk down the dark dusty road.

Guillaume came to a little village on the edge of nowhere and paid for a spot in the stable with the dead man’s copper. 

Didn’t kill a damned person because he was plump and full. Just sat in the main room and drank beer. Listened to them talk about some legend or other of a black knight guarding a sacred well whose water could heal sickness. Or tales about how the trail down from the mountains was beaten flat every morning because the Fair Folk were riding down it every night. Or with glances at him and his collar, men possessed by demons that did the work of foul sorcerers. Unlikely. Most sorcerers could do their own foul work. He drank his beer, and slept with Sparkita in the stable. The good citizens were too canny to rent rooms to the undead.

Not canny enough to kill him on sight, but everyone had their faults.

He sat in the stable and curried Sparkita. Braided her tail and mane while she slept. He didn’t sleep much these days. 

Caught a nap to dream of horses that were fish that ran across blue, blue water that turned to red in which he drowned. Struggling and tossed in the waves of blood and limbs smashing into him unseen. 

Woke to the earth rumbling as it gave three quick shakes. 

Guillaume didn’t like it. The earth didn’t do that here. Could be a dragon, although there weren’t many of them left. Maybe Kobolds shifting the earth to make shiny new metals. Could be Frost Giants with some new thunder roar.

Guillaume supposed it didn’t matter much to him. Not anymore. 

He saddled Sparkita and headed out into trees and nowhere.


	8. Three --- Felipe --- London, Tower --- His own time

His Royal Majesty, Felipe de Habsburgo, King of Portugal, Naples, Jerusalem, Spain, Sicily, and the New World Entire, King Consort of England, was drowning in paperwork. 

His father, the Holy Roman Emperor, had given him his inheritance early. An empire on which the sun never set. Deluged in debts. Slogging through a war with France, and propping up an unpaid army.

He signed the paper with a flourish. The Genoese bankers vulture-smiled at the papers with their fifty-eight percent gifts on money exchanged between friends. Never call it interest. That would be un-Christian. 

Tons of New World bullion and it was barely enough to stem the tide of debts. 

It would be worth it. He’d clear the Low Lands of idolaters, break the navies of the Turk, wring lands from that sickly French boy, strike North into York and Scotland, put an end to privateers and pirates. 

His armies would be paid this month. He'd pay the interest on his un-Christian Jewish loans, and next month, when the silver shipment came in, the Genoses wretches would be paid, and principal, and it would be worth it.

He'd written his Governor Generals with the last convoy. They were to push into unmapped lands. Here there be dragons and where there be dragons, there was always gold.

When his conquistadors found glittering El Dorado, he’d flick off the maggots that fed on his flesh. 

A King’s Fifth of the New World, the English coffers flung open by his bride, and it wasn’t enough. 

The Genoese bankers smiled on. Felipe gritted his teeth and smiled back.


	9. Stone Men --- Devon --- Era

A Giant glared out of the hillside and on new fern forests beyond  
He was made of lines. Strips of sod cut away from the hill to create the image of a naked man holding a club. The club was not the Giant’s most imposing feature. The ancient people that had carved him had wanted to make a statement about their manliness.

So the Giant of Cockswell glared out of the hillside and menaced the gently curving hills with his club and cock.

The hills had been menaced for millennia and no longer cared. The Giant was all promise and no delivery. To the south, a wall of giant ferns waved gently in the breeze. To the north, the trees swayed and made their slow sap cycles through the year, while birds swooped and spiraled through the sky. They took care to stay north of the ferns. The air was sweeter there.

The hills slept, barely noticing as the Giant’s lines crackled with blue lights. Stone men pulled themselves from the crackling lines with booms and pops and granite grinds. They had many names. Kobolds. Lranga. Ma ond. Stone men. They crackled from many places.

Spilling out of the ley lines, they streamed up to where the Giant pointed and dug into the hillside.

The Earth shifted a little in its sleep, but didn’t wake up. Soon, but not now. Now was the last few precious moments before the cockerel crowed. The Earth fell silent, and the stone men resumed their digging.

First they dug an entrance, consuming the dirt and stone as they dug. Then they dug a cave. Round and packed smooth. Leaving only a long low slab of stone in the center of the cave. Hammered and ate and smoothed. Hollowing out five tunnels that spread out. Spiraling into the Hill and down.

At first, the valley echoed with the sound of their labors. The sounds grew fainter and fainter as they burrowed down into the earth.

Until finally, there was only the sigh of the wind in the trees and the quiet inhale of the cave above the menacing Giant made of lines cut in the earth.


	10. Three --- Suleiman  --- Istanbul --- Ramadan 19, 962

Suleiman Khan - Shadow of God, Lawgiver, Sultan of Sultans, the Shah of Baghdad and Iraq, Sultan of Egypt and Jerusalem, Caesar of all the lands of Rome - prayed in his aerie. 

The north wind paused and the waters of the Golden Horn shimmered in the light of the dying sun. Europe and Asia grappled with tectonic earth arms, groaned with tension beneath the bloody water. 

The djinns on their perches preened and prayed and waited in the echoing light.

The old man, the great sultan sat up with creaking bones. 

As the north wind skulked across the city and the sun slipped into orange haze oblivion, the djin sighed in voices of smokeless fire. Gave tidings of hot sedition and frozen rivers. Of the deaths of old pontiffs and child kings. Of requests and demands and secrets. Related offers that dared not be written. Could not be written. The smoky reflection of a thought. Whispered the world.

Suleiman the Lawgiver listened. He smoothed gnarled fingers over the knots in the carpet. The aerie glowed in the light of the djin as they clustered to keep the Sultan warm in their regard. 

“Is there time, you think, before the sun’s light fades?” he asked, looking at his city, his throne of lonely niche.

“Yes,” they crackled. “Just enough time,” they whispered, “before the light fades.”

“Then the faithful shall go to Vienna,” said the great sultan Suleiman, slave of God and ruler of kings.

The djin shifted on their perches and blinked burning eyes. 

A single feather fell from a red gold djin. It spun like an ember, like a star. It fell down to the dusty street far below, where it winked once and then went dark.


	11. Two --- Legate Pole --- Blue Time

Her eyes were nothing like the sun. A cool soft blue that understood every pain. Comforted every sin.

Pole looked up into the Virgin’s painted eyes and tried to clear his mind every thing, but Hail Mary, full of grace.

His gut hurt, knotted as if he’d eaten rotten ham. He'd fasted with only water for days. His knees hurt. He'd knelt in front of the wooden statue of the blessed virgin for hours. Penance for almost bludgeoning Bishop Gardiner during the trials. 

He was drowning by a murder of crows. Black wool and black velvet splendor. A parliament of jackdaws cawing from their white ruffs as the trials crept through their many legged motions.

He hadn’t returned to England to kill good souls. To watch Bishop Gardiner lick his lips to glistening as each new man was brought to his fate.

Pole breathed in and breathed out. Looked up into the Virgin’s painted eyes. Gardiner hadn’t always been this way. He reminded himself of the Bishop’s bravery. Of all he’d endured. Of the help he’d given Pole’s mother. He was a good man. Pole must cling to that. They were all good men.

Legate Pole knelt before the Blessed Virgin and prayed that everything that was happening be to some purpose. And it seemed, the Virgin smiling down, that she answered with her compassion eyes.


	12. Two --- Doctor John Dee --- Water Boiling

Distilling the essence of the Pentas Lanceolata Spiritus was slow work. 

Lucretia whispered, "Star flowers, Papa, they get confused when you Latin them." She held up the prism Dee had given her, casting colors across the wall. Lucretia loved rainbows. She was so full of light herself. 

"Yes, Lucretia." He carefully moved the blue salamander below the golden bowl to warm the rain water within. The bowl had to be gold, because that was the only incorruptible metal. The liquid had to be spring water from the heart of a mountain, because that was the purest of water. Everything had to be perfect or Dee would not be able to create the tool described in the book Lucretia had found for him.

He resisted the automatic glance for Lucretia. To see what she was doing now. To see that she was safe and careful. 

He needed to watch what he was doing. He placed the star flowers one by one into the water. He adjusted a set of glass tubes to capture the distilled essence of the flowers and merge it with blue ambergris, which was a catalyst for change. 

Dee put his hand on his back and sighed. Nauseous from so many trips along the ley lines. 

He looked up and smiled at his daughter. Lucretia didn't seem to mind. She skipped around the room with her prism as if they'd merely gone picking flowers by the lake. 

She held her prism over his brass model of the celestial spheres making scattered rainbows. 

Dee should get back to translating the Borgia Codex. To trying to understand every aspect of the threat they faced. Instead, he watched Lucretia fragment and spin around the room, while flowers distilled through glass tubes.


	13. Miguel --- Guanax-juato --- 11 Acatl 1 Tochtli 10 Olin

Miguel was all mixed up. Old Spain father, and a Mixteca mother. Dark skin and red hair. Mining silver ore down deep. Dreaming of the sun.

Except Sunday. Then he climbed from the dark and up the long trail to grandmama’s.

He’d walk up and she’d hold out a piece of blood soaked maize bread. “Hey now, use those long spider daddy legs and put this out for the stone men.”

He sighed. No one seen stone men longtime. He walked behind the house. Still crumbs from the last offering. Time was the stone men took the bread right up and the spirits kept people safe.

Miguel threw the bread as far as he could. Pretty far. He went back to grandmama. She said, “So, red-haired boy, lemme guess what story you wanna hear.” Beautiful old eyes twinkled. “Course today is for Xipe Toltec. Maybe I should tell his story.”

“Oh, I don’t like me that Xipe. All skin peeling off.” He shuddered extra large. “Tell me about that bad old Tezcatlipoca killing the old sun and Quetzalcoatl making the new one.”

She tickled him. “Maybe someone thinks he’s Quetzalcoatl with his red hair.”

“Maybe,” he said, and warmed himself in her smile.

It began where it always did, in the old world, with Smoking Mirror up to his old tricks, the old world destroyed, and ended with the red-plumed serpent in his golden city of Tollan with the fifth sun rising on a new day.

Sunday ended. The day ended and the next day began.

On Monday, he went into the earth again. Slammed his pick down and thought about new worlds he’d like to create.

On Tuesday, the earth shook and within moments, the vast series of mines under the city had collapsed like an old woman’s veins. Leaving nothing dust and rubble. As an old woman wept on the hill, it seemed there were no more new worlds to make.


	14. Three ---  Suleiman --- Serbia --- 35th Year of Reign

Like stars, like ants, like blades of grass, like nothing that had ever been before or would ever be again, the army of Sultan Suleiman blanketed the landscape. The sight of which shamed the memory of ancient Xerses into oblivion. 

A forest of spears bristled against the rain. Mountains had been melted down to forge the dull metal carapaces pinging with the sound of the downpour. An Egyptian year went into the sodden cotton flags that snapped in the sullen wind.

Faced with a swelling river, the Sultan sat on his mare and said, "It is beneath my dignity to allow the weather to interfere with my plans." 

He glanced at his favorite daughter, Mihrimar. Even but lately risen from childbed, she said nothing, only laughed with her eyes.

"Shh," he said. Spoiled his chide by coughing.

Her laughing eyes turned to concern. "I said nothing, my father," said Mihrimar. "I am merely waiting for the Sultan to command the wind to fly his army across the waters."

Suleiman said, "My daughter, everyone aims at the same meaning, but many are the versions of the story. As it is not right that the daughter of the Sultan should have to wait, I shall tell my version of the tale." He nodded and the wise men came forward. They held up gnarled fingers in supplication, their voices droning over the pulse of the rain.

Muddy waters lurched into the air. Curled through the sky in a ribbon loop of brown and muck, leaving the river bed below dry as a bone.

The army of the Sultan Suleiman flowed forward under the filthy arc of the river. Soldiers called out to the startled fish flying over them. Splashed spears through the wet. 

When all had passed, the wise men lowered the river like a wailing baby into its cranky bed, to beat at the rocks and roar against the storm.


	15. Five – Henri --- Rome, Vatican --- Work Day

Henri turned a page in his book. The Good Knight was fighting a frost giant with a magic sword that sang.

"Cardinal Henri," said some shoes. "We're getting ready to vote again." The shoes belonged to Cardinal Mendoza, who Itz said belonged to the Holy Roman Emperor. Cardinal Mendoza crouched down. "What are you reading?"

Henri sat up, mumbled, "Romance of the Good Knight and the Basilisk." He grabbed his dried figs, and slouched to where the Cardinals were gathering. 

Cardinal Mendoza looked really happy. "The stories about the Good Knight were my favorites when I was a boy." He took his place in line.

Henri looked up at Cardinal Mendoza. "There are more?" Henri scribbled Cervini's name on a scrap of paper. and dropped it in the Carpenter's cup. Cardinal Mendoza seemed surprised, just like Itz said he'd be. Henri kicked at his robes. "How much longer is this going to take?" 

Cardinal Mendoza smiled. "Hopefully not much longer." 

But it did while they counted. Mendoza told Henri about some of the other stories, while Henri ate his figs. Then he realized that wasn't very polite, so he offered Mendoza a fig that he'd already taken a bit of like Itz had told him he ought to do with anyone not Marcellus.

Mendoza gravely took a fig and ate it.

Then Cardinal HenriForgotHisName called, "We have a new Pope," and Cervini was crying. 

Henri said, "Finally!" but really, Henri felt bad. He sort of wanted to be like the Good Knight and save people, but he wanted to be like Itz and rip people's hearts out. Henri held up the little velvet sack with the Pope's poison present. "Now I can give him his present."

Cardinal Mendoza smiled pleasantly. "May I see it?"

Itz had said he'd say that. Henri pulled out the rosary. "It's kind of boring, but Itz said Popes like boring." He handed it to Cardinal Mendoza. Henri looked over to where they were burning the vote papers to make white smoke. Henri said, "I should give it to him now, so I can leave." 

Cardinal Mendoza said, "I can see you're very determined." He paused and said, "You should be careful of bad influences. Rome is a dangerous place."

"Yeah, Itz says the same thing," said Henri. 

"Ah, yes, Mistress Itz," said Cardinal Mendoza. Sighed. "Let's give the new Pope your gift so you can be on your way." He smiled. "Finally!" 

Then they stood in line and talked about the Good Knight until they got to where Marcellus Cervini was crying. Henri held out the little bag. "Here, this is a gift from your, I mean her most Catholic Majesty on your um..." Henri couldn't remember what he was supposed to say. "Here."

Marcellus looked at Cardinal Mendoza, who nodded, and the Pope pulled out the rosary. "It is lovely, my son." Then Marcellus kissed the golden cross and wiped at the tears in his eyes, just like Itz said he would.

Henri backed away. He felt kind of sick to his stomach. Not from the poison. It didn't work that way.

Then he went outside and Itz's black carriage was waiting for him. He felt light inside. He ran to it.


	16. One --- Captain Pedrillo --- Caribbean --- Behind Schedule

Captain Pedrillo watched the Silver fleet lumbering before the wind. A green cay slip slowly away. 

The water around the ship began to froth, as if boiling, and there was a high whistling sound. The stench of rotten eggs. Above the islands, black clouds of birds rose into the air, squawking. 

Then he had other wories, as five low slung French ships came from behind one of the cays, sailing fast. 

Pedrillo yelled, "Cannon crews to your stations." 

At the tail end of the fleet, Pedrillo saw the other galleon, take a hit as chain shot slashed through her rigging and her mast snapped.

Pedrillo felt his ship shudder on the up and down slap of the waves as her cannons were cranked into place.

Another ship, de-masted, fell behind. 

"Come on. You bastard carracks get your cannons out." Don Pedrillo prayed that none of the captains had been foolish enough to hide smuggled bullion disguised as cannon. Silver sold well, but it made for poor artillery for castles under siege. 

Fortunately, the Ciudad was slow, but she had twenty cannon royale. Pedrillo yelled, “Fire! ” The cannons screamed their broadsides. Cannon balls slammed into hulls and masts and rained wooden dagger splinters. 

It was hell. 

Then it was worse than hell.

The water dipped and the ship was flying up on a rolling mountain of water. Pedrillo clung to the rigging. He could feel their speed in his gut..

In the distance, he saw a long line of green.

Then it wasn't so distant. 

The wave slammed over the trees far below. The ship tipped forward and slid down the smooth green curve of the curling water. He looked up and could see the white crest of the wave high above.

And then the water fell.


	17. Basilikos --- His Village --- Now

Basilikos was famous.

Not only for his beauty, but for his valor and generosity. His greatest treasure was the poem that said this was so. He liked to slide across the pages, but he was careful to never lick it, lest the pages begin to burn.

It was his mirror. The Goodly Knight had told him that it would be, and Basilikos loved the Goodly Knight because it was true. Because the Goodly Knight had sent him this book, the romance of the Knight and the Basilisk.

Travelers came to the village below to leave offerings for his great fame. At least once a moon, one of the villagers would climb up the rocks and tell him some new story that was told about him. Speaking respectfully, eyes turned away, as was only correct when a villager faced a king.

Basilikos preened his crest of feathers when this happened, and he loved his villagers for in their words he knew that he was beautiful. Loved them enough to never eat them, not even the foolish little boy who tried to make him look into a mirror, for which the boy’s mother apologized very beautifully and gave Basilikos a bucket of goat milk.

Tonight, Basilikos coiled tight on his poem and waited for someone to come up to the rocks and tell him a story, but no one came.

It was chilly, and Basilikos did not want to move, but he was a king, and kings took care of their subjects, or so the Goodly Knight had said, and the knight that Basilikos loved had been correct about so many things.

Therefore, Basilikos crept down to his village. He called out to the villagers, but he did not hear them. This worried him.

He climbed down between the rocks as fast as he could and came into his village. Basilikos hissed.

There were things in his village, eating his villagers. They were his to eat or not eat. That was what made him a king. One of the things turned to look at him with wide black eyes and died. Stupid creature. Basilikos was a king and no one met the eyes of a king.

Basilikos walked over to where they were swarming in the middle of his village. Basilikos spat at them.

Then Basilikos heard them screaming. Turning to look at him with their wide stupid eyes. They died as monsters who face a king should. Quickly.

Basilikos picked his way carefully through the bodies. Spitting and hissing. Flickering his tongue to see if there were any of them left in His village.

He found a little boy in a house. Basilikos told the little boy there was nothing to be afraid of and that Basilikos would keep him safe. The little boy said, “Thank you,” and Basilikos curled around him once to comfort him.

As they went from house to house looking for more things and survivors, the little boy told Basilikos the story of what Basilikos had just done. Basilikos preened. It was a very good story.

But in the distance, Basilikos could taste the creatures’ scent.

He told the boy that if he were very brave, he would carry Basilikos to the creatures. For Basilikos could not walk very fast. They would need a goat to carry the Basilikos’ book, because this might be a long journey.

The boy agreed, and that was good, because Basilikos didn’t think he could do it without the boy, but a king should not turn his back on his people when they needed him. That was what made him a king. That was what the Goodly Knight had said, and because Basilikos loved the Goodly Knight, he knew that it was true.


	18. Four --- Maia ---  346 Year of Pearl

Maia was dreaming of bygone ages. When the mer still walked in the light of the first Sun. 

She woke up tired and cranky. Crammed into a coral crevice in a shallow sea. Her joints hurt, but that was normal. In the distance, there was a series of low booming noises and the water tasted like sulfur. Tiny bubbles spiraled in the sea.. 

Something slammed into the coral two feet from her, a box like the air dwellers liked, it's silver spilling onto the ocean floor. Maia moved faster than she thought her old bones could. Dodging falling boxes like a youngster.

Maia swam to the surface to see what was going on. Always had been too curious. She blamed the mark. Maia looked at the hard blue sky and wondered what it had been like for the ancestors. When they walked beneath the sun and didn't fear the stars. 

Didn't matter. What mattered were the surface ships belching fire and hurling metal at each other. She could hear screaming. The water was boiling with sulfur bubbles.

She couldn't understand why they were fighting when they needed to be going into deeper waters. She swam East. 

Far below, she heard the sound of the earth cracking. The water sank down and then up again on the slap of a wave. Throwing them forward like an angry toddler with a toy. Her heart pounded as she tumbled past broken ships and drowning sailors. She grabbed one of them, poor boy. 

Swam along the curve of the great wave as it curled over an island. She didn't need to out run the wave, that was a youngling's trick, she just needed not to be crushed by falling water. 

She pulled the boy along the surface of the water. Below them submerged trees waved as the water surged and pulled back. She left the boy clinging to a palm tree. Not much else she could do. It wasn't as if she could breathe air, and there wasn't much time. She swam east toward the rising sun. Hopefully she could get out of this shallow sea before she died of a heart attack.


	19. Three --- Legate Pole --- London, Religious Courts --- Wednesday

Legate Pole was drowning by a murder of crows. Black wool and black velvet splendor. Even the guard's armor reflected the dull darkness of this parliament of jackdaws cawing from their white ruffs as the trial crept through its many legged motions.

Legate Pole tried to imagine himself as just an observer. The queasy knot in his stomach wouldn't let him.

Bishop Gardiner licked his lips to glistening as each new man was brought to his fate.

Today it was the defrocked Bishop Hooper’s turn. Bishop Gardiner leaning across the bench, yelling, “Traitor! Heretic!” Hooper calling Gardiner, "Persecutor of the people! Oath breaker!" 

The words flew back and forth like darts, and what pricked forth were the murmurs of the crowd

The Lord Chancellor rapped his gavel for order and somewhere in the yard, a harpy screeched. The punishment for being a traitor was to be devoured, while heretics were merely burned alive.

Legate Pole felt ill. As if he’d eaten bad mutton; he’d had nothing more than bread and water for days. Fasted over his Hail Mary’s and prayed for guidance.

Legate Pole sighed and forced himself to pay attention to the trial.

It droned on in its pace. Gardiner yelled. Hooper said some incendiary answer until Bishop Gardiner’s face was glistening with sweat. Yelling for a verdict. The Lord Chancellor rapped his gavel and the cawing clerics spoke their answers each in turn. Legate Pole swallowed his gorge and said his line, “Guilty.”

The guards stepped forward to strip Hooper of his robes and take him old and frail from the room. 

The crowd whispered and then bled out.

Legate Pole sat in the room for a long time. Reflected in carefully shined armor along the w all and wondered how he'd gotten here.


	20. Four --- Tristan --- Rome --- Adulthood

Tristan sauntered by the Coliseum. He was gawking. A tourist in an eternal city. A plump purse on his belt. 

Two dark haired girls came up to him. One of the girls held a box that blocked his view below his own chest. 

But, she was clumsy. He felt her go for his purse. He liked to think he'd never been that raw.

As she turned to run, her friend primed to trip him, he put a death grip on her arm

Course if he hadn't been that raw, he never would have tried to pluck Itz's purse.

His prisoner said, "Please sirrah, I didn't do nothing.." 

The other girl began to cry. "Please, sirrah. We got a sick mother at home. There's little ones too."

"Please!" Tristan sighed; these were the first street rats to try to rob him. "It's your lucky day, because I may have a job for you."

The clumsy thief jerked at her captured wrist. "We don't do that sorta thing."

Tristan plucked his pouch from her captured hand and let her go. Smiled. "You're not my type." He reached into his pouch and pulled out a rock. He let them see it. "Smart man doesn't keep his money in his pouch, but it makes a useful cosh." Let them digest that, then palmed a copper coin. "If you can follow me without my noticing, then you can have this coin, and more for following people I set you on." 

The older girl with the terrible tears said, "No one sees us when we don't want 'em to." 

"Then you'll end up with a job." He started walking to the taverna where Carlo Caraffa and his toughs liked to drink and talk about the good old days in Napoli.

The girls melted into an alleyway and he smiled at the Coliseum like a tourist.


	21. Three --- Charles --- Rome - Day 1 Party

This was a monumental waste of his time.

Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, sourly toasted the new Pope. Again. 

Not that the election of a new Pope hadn't merited his full attention. Well worth the journey, but this, he grimaced at the cardinals and princes of state smiling and pretending to like each other, was a waste of time on a Biblical scale.

The Turk were on the march. Charles needed to be in Vienna overseeing reinforcements of outposts and raising monies for troops not, this, this, he raised his cup again, waste. 

From his vantage by the Pope, Charles saw France's creature and her sniveling mockery of a child cardinal creep about the room. He made himself do no more than narrow his eyes. He contemplated setting ruffians upon them, as they left the party, but Mistress Itz had a way of killing ruffians and sending the remains to their masters with a polite note. 

Charles would deal with Mistress Itz later. He raised his glass to the new Pope again. His new Pope, while her favored candidate stood lonely by threadbare tapestry. 

Let her have her machinations. In the end, Mistress Itz would find the she was of no consequence.

He toasted silently to the idea and drank deeply from his glass.


	22. Two --- Kappa --- Kyoto --- 17 Chushu

Kappa squatted by the green pool and contemplated the wind rumpled reflection of the red maple and a brown Tori gate. Kappa picked up one of the cucumbers that the mothers left by the pool. He nibbled delicately with wide rubbery lips. Kappa loved the flavor of cucumbers even more than he liked the livers of small children. 

Jumped over to a rock on the far side of the pool. Now the red castle joined the maples rippling in the water. He watched the soldiers waging beautiful battle in the reflection. As each soldier fell, a black butterfly would emerge from the soldiers lips to swirl in a cloud above the castle.

It was quite ascetically pleasing. 

Then high up, at the farthest point in the sky, a coil of white wind uncurled.

Kappa contemplated the castle and the tornado. He waited to see what would happen. The tornado touched down in the middle of the castle. Towers blended together in a whirl, turning the tornado's white winds red and gold.

Kappa contemplated this fine example of the impermanence of things. He decided that perhaps it would be best if he went into his home under the green pool.

He slipped into the cold water, but not rapid enough.

The tornado picked up the green water and the frogs and the butterflies and Kappa.

Kappa whirled high above the earth. Kappa grew weak as the wind whipped him around. He did not see the tornado scour the city below. Which was a great shame, for he would have appreciated it if he were able.


	23. Tzitzimime --- Sea off of Greenland --- Mill of Time

The Tzitzimime had fallen a long way.

Scorched and cracked. Its skin steamed in the icy water, peeling away in large strips. Its blood boiled. Spread out. Corroded what it touched.

The lives in the water fled. It was too tired to chase them.

It didn’t matter.

It tasted the water with its shiny new skin. The sea currents tasted warm and red. It had been a long time waiting. Watching. Its envy eyes growling with hunger.

It let the current take it. Push and tumble it. It was so weary. Weary as a star.

It had fallen so far. So fast. It did not know where its siblings had fallen. But it was here. It was hungry. Empty. Echoing.

It unfolded its tendrils and let the current carry it toward the stony shore. It tumbled on the wave. Crashed with the water’s grind into the stony sand. Climbed dripping onto the shale and rocks. Licked its thin mouths. Cracked its spines in their sheaths. Snapped its wings supple and dry. Felt the cold, wet breeze playing on its skin. Smelled sulfur and tasted ash.

It would have to hurry.

Somewhere, high above the stormy clouds, the fifth sun was shining brightly.

There was a warmth ahead. Sod and earth buildings. Light and laughter. The sounds shivered across its skin like a thousand fingers.

Delicious.


	24. Lapu --- Isle of Luzon --- Brightest Day

Lapu walked in the stream bed and let cool mud refresh his tired feet. He looked down at Village. Wife waved at him. She pointed. Son was under House again. Most like he was hiding from Rooster. Most like Wife would want Lapu to do something about it. Lapu sighed. Soon now.

He looked up at Mountain Left to Grow. Its cone puffed rings of smoke. He looked at the still trees. Soon Rains would come. Soon now.

Plant rice. Fish by Blue Ocean. Harvest. A good life.

Maybe, he should kill Rooster. Mean creature. Cook him in ginger and sugar. Make him sweet. Son would like that.

Lapu walked down streambed to Beach. Blue Ocean washed white powder. Sand burned his feet good. He twitched his feet to sink into cool.

Got into his little skiff and paddled from shore. Fishermen were in by now.

Sun beat down.

Lapu liked heat. Silence. Just Blue Ocean and Paddle and Lapu. Soon Rains would start and he’d have to stay close to shore.

He paddled out over the waves.

Drank water. Ate rice. He would go home soon now.

Then Lapu’s world stopped. Mountain Left to Grow spat fire into Sky and burning mud rolled down Mountain’s sides and trees flamed.

Lapu paddled, but Beach was far away.

Lapu paddled and Sky went grey as burning white powder fell. On Mountain. On Village. On Beach. On Blue Ocean. On each island in island chain.

Villagers on faraway islands and cays pointed.

Mountain Left to Grow, Pinatubo, was spitting fire and mud and ash.

Soon now, Red Rain would begin to fall.


	25. Tzitzimime --- Lindsfarne Abbey --- Occultation

The Tzitzimime crawled from the water. High and low boomings were ringing up the hill. It sat on a rock and shook the water from its body. Snapped at its two siblings as they crowded onto its rock. Stretched tendrils for hidden caresses and sharp shoves.

The breeze crawled down stone steps carrying the smell of cattle and unwashed men. Warmed with wood smoke. Fires and flesh.

It sang hello. They all sang. Men come out the great door. Flung it open. Arms outstretched. It was a feast of the senses. Sound and scent and touch. They were so small and warm and rough. Too soon cold.

It touched everything. Tasted everything. Rubbed its flesh and spines against every surface. Except the one that stank. It left that one alone.

Instead it went to be gentle with the white cow with the crooked horn. Rough with the wooden doors that concealed hidden banquets of delight. Flinging walls open with the delight of what was inside. Until finally they were down to the last morsel. It wrestled with its siblings for a taste. Writhed in the red-and-pumping on the floor. Beautiful.

Full, it climbed to the top of the stone buildings. Wanted to ring the dead metal. Make cold earth sing like the feast did. Jumped up and down on the rope and swung. Let the weight of ringing carry it, as its siblings joined in.

It did not remember when it had been happier.

Then it sat with its siblings on the grey stone roof and looked out across the water at the line of green in the distance.

The breeze washed over it. Carrying the scents of worms and beetles and trees and cows and sheep and people. Its heart felt full and it let the breeze play on its skin.


	26. Rainbow serpent --- The Dreaming

Rainbow serpent watched with slitted eyes as the violet sky burned with red fire.

Rainbow serpent curled herself into that fire sky. Somewhere yellow bees were swarming. She could hear them, but she smelled none of the yellow honey that she loved.

Rainbow serpent slipped across the sky trails, between rivers of burning rain. Below, the land was dying. Where she had thrown down her blue thunder stick and black stones to make islands, everything was dead. Yellow Kangaroo rotted. Green Crocodile lay cold beneath the gum trees.

So Rainbow serpent took back her blue thunder stick. Snapped it on and was a him again. He picked up his black stones, islands no more. He slipped down out of the burning sky into the cool green billabong in the center of the red land.

Slipped down. Rippled into the Dreaming where something new waited to be born.


	27. Two --- Pietre --- Savoy --- Meteor Shower

Pietre lay on the blanket, bundled against the cold, surrounded by his goats and stared up.

Tonight, for once there was a clear night sky. 

The sky was falling. 

He watched streaks of light race each other across the sky and over the horizon. Green and blue. Flashes. Pops of white. Like something so wonderful and beautiful that he didn't know what it was. 

He was all alone, and somehow that made it seem like it was it was all just for him.

The breeze picked up. He held his wool blanket around him more closely. Just a few more moments. He'd count to ten, and then he'd go inside his shelter. 

One, two, three, and he heard singing. He wasn't frightened. Alone on the mountain with his goats and flute. 

The sound was beautiful, like everything that was pure and clean. Like fresh snow on Christmas morning. 

Then he saw them and he began to cry. The Angels were so wonderful and he was so happy, and he felt like it was all just for him.


	28. Cecil --- Whitby --- Long Trip Back

For a short progress, it was very long.

First, packing the books of Lindsfarne took hours.

Then, after some thought, Cecil sent several messengers to the forts at Vinham and Marshsea to call for militia to gather in York. The kingdom had no standing army, but the adventure that didn’t end with Her Majesty riding into York being pursued by all the demons of hell (or fey, or primordial ooze, or whathaveyou) was the odd adventure indeed. Also, Cecil didn’t like the word he was getting of Felipe’s movements south of the border. Finally, that word should be sent to throughout the kingdom that demons with an aversion to stink (they thought) were on the move.

All in all, a normal summer’s occupation.

The progress became longer as Cecil stared at Whitby harbor and the waves of impossibilities spreading out from a tree growing in the middle of one of the docks.

Townsfolk boiled down streets fighting Vikings. In the river, a giant reptile lay dead from cannon shot. Meanwhile the Abbey was a burnt ruin with full-grown trees growing from its arches.

First things first. The Vikings would have to be dealt with.

Sometimes, Cecil hated that his life had such sentences in it.

Cecil said to the head guard, “Use distance weapons. Viking armor isn’t built to withstand our modern weaponry.”

The guard turned to his men. “You heard his Lordship. Let’s go kill some Viking scum.” He sounded far too cheerful.

The battle that followed wasn’t precisely a rout. However, boiled leather was no match for a crossbow bolt.

Cecil rubbed his beard and considered the mix of eras. Someone had been playing with time magic, with predictable results.

So much for the miracle of Whitby. At least it answered where the Vikings had disappeared to. Yet, had the Vikings sacked the town centuries ago, the town and the Abbey might not have existed to be attacked now.

Good Lord, he hated paradox.

But one step at a time. The tree in the harbor.

The head guard greeted him at the docks. “They didn’t know what hit them.”

“I imagine not,” said Cecil. He spotted some coiled cord. He crisscrossed it about himself while saying, “Tempus Fugit” and other related phrases. He said, “We’ll need to mend the tear.”

“Err, in what sir?” asked the head guard.

“Pay attention, man. Time. Someone’s been playing fast and loose with it.” He walked around the tree. There was a scattered pile of pages around its roots.

He picked them up. It was the Borgia Codex.

Cecil opened his mouth and closed it. First things first; he needed to mend the tear in time. Then he could read the pages and hopefully find out how to save the world.


	29. Five --- Butterfly --- Astrakhan --- 14 Cumku

The stone butterfly slowly crawled out of the mouth of a corpse. The butterfly growled at the burning city. 

The black butterfly was hungry. It chewed on the lips of the corpse. The wind called to it, but the butterfly didn't understand. 

It flew into the air. Joined a glittering black cloud of butterflies.

It hovered in the sky and looked down at the city and the camps of men surrounding it. 

The butterfly was angry. They all were. Growling and hungry. They descended on a man and his horse. Ate them both. Even the saddle. But that wasn't right. Fluttered back into the air as the ground began to buck and jolt like the horse had. 

The butterfly understood that. Understood stone. Could hear the rocks grinding at each other far below the crust of dirt. Could feel the liquid stone far below. Pushing at continents. It knew what a continent was, but not where it was. It did not know the name of the city. Did not know its own name.

The wind was pushing at the butterfly.

The butterfly let the wind carry it. Snapped its wings and listened to the growling butterflies all around it as they fluttered toward the setting sun.


	30. Five --- Cecil --- York --- Eternity

Days of polite smiling and dealing with , "What about the dead Vikings?" and "What is that in the river?" and "What should we do about the abbey?" And then did he get to read the book that could save the world? No. He was too busy arranging for a fishing vessel to speed the trip back to York. He had to divide the court into the useful, and the annoying, and those who could not be insulted. Gracious God in his heaven, it took hours to make these people leave. 

The Codex burning a hole, not literally, in the library above.

Until, finally, he was able to read through the night. 

In the morning, the sun rose in the east, as it tended to do, and he stared at it. Well, not exactly at it. Stared in the sun's general direction then. After reading until his eyes blurred, he knew several things.

Firstly, he had no idea how to translate the pictograms in the Codex from the original language. 

Secondly, the person who had filled the margins with notes had execrable spelling and wrote like a chicken.

Thirdly, that his eyes hurt a great deal. 

Fourthly, he knew they were in quite a lot of trouble, which wasn't exactly news.

He stared in the sun's general direction. The Fifth sun. 

According to the notes, the natives who wrote the codex believed that there had been four previous worlds, each of which had been destroyed in a great cataclysm, and a new world created. Each of the previous four ages was represented by one of the symbol on that cursed in it's crate mirror. Too bad the mirror had disappeared along with the Abbey. But then Cecil would rather not be a fish, which was apparently the fate of the people of the first sun. 

He gratefully drank some of the black tea that had appeared at his elbow. It was cold. He drank it anyway.

He took notes. He rubbed his eyes. He longed for more tea. 

Then he sighed and got ready to deal with the part of the day that wouldn't save the world, but would get him breakfast.


	31. Two --- Felipe --- Baiting

Queen Obsidian was baiting a bear, slashing it with some sort of axe, while the court cheered. 

But King Felipe wasn't really paying attention. The day before yesterday, a small merchant ship had sailed into Southampton harbor. Carrying the sole survivor of the Silver Fleet. A young midshipman.

He'd said that a great wave had risen from the depths to smash every vessel in the fleet. Tears in his eyes, the boy had wept that an angel had held him in her arms and saved him from the sea. 

She might as well not have bothered. Felipe couldn't let his armies know that the money to pay then was at the bottom of the sea. He'd had it seen to that there was no merchant ship. No midshipman. He'd had to order it himself. For the life of him, Felipe couldn't remember where Alvarado had gotten to. It wasn't like him.

"Don't be troubled my not-Father?" asked Obsidian. Her face was splashed with bear's blood. She brushed his cheek with a sticky slick hand. "You should get your rest. Tomorrow is a big day."

Felipe nodded, "Yes." He breathed in. Tomorrow was a big day. Once he conquered York, everything would be fine. He leaned his head into Obsidian's soft wet hand. Everything was going to be just fine.


	32. White Boar --- Scotland --- Waking

He’d slept for years on his bed of bones. There were curving marks of ribs and long fingers pressed into his flesh. The floor and walls of his cave were lined with them. His Hunters. Surrounding him with their sharp points and hard curves.

He was old. Too old to be waking before his time. But there was something wrong in the way the sun rose and set. In the way the air moved over his skin.

He walked to the front of his cave and looked into the eye of the sun high above the valley, red-tinged from dust in the air. Felt the stone beneath his feet shake. Knew what he knew when he went to sleep. When he’d chosen his last Hunter. Had her chosen for him.

The world was old and he was old and he was tired. Too old and too tired to be awake.

Except she had come. His master’s shadow.

The White Boar snorted. Just because he was old didn’t mean he wasn’t strong. Strength had always been his. Even before. He’d see about that hussy. He trotted quickly out of his cave and down the stony hillside toward the city where she laired.


	33. Aniwaya --- Shasta --- Time to Go

Aniwaya turned into a wolf the day Mount Shasta blew up.

The two things were not unrelated.

Aniwaya hadn’t needed a spirit woman to tell him what a rumbling mountain meant. Aniwaya was old, but he still had his wits. He knew what it meant when it snowed ash and brown snow. When winter never turned to summer. When traders said that every great mountain up from the Southern desert to the Northern ice was belching fire. Rumbling every day.

Problem with being the oldest of the People, they expected you to know things, when mostly you knew that you weren’t dead yet.

So he’d asked for help. Gone up to the three-tunnel cave from which the People had emerged into this world long ago. Asked the spirits for help. Got a little white spirit girl who gave him a black rock. Spirits were like that sometimes.

Shasta rumbled and smoked. Aniwaya had told everyone to camp by the three-tunnel cave and made stone soup. Needed to boil the water anyway, the rivers were poison. Made everyone drink a cup. Woke up the next day a wolf with red-brown fur. Aniwaya growled. Spirits! He picked up the black stone in his teeth.

He ran into the cave, his people following behind. He could see the spirit trails now clear as the moon on the water. Ran down the silver lines where the spirit girl had already gone.


	34. Veronica --- Venice --- Year of No Summer

The canals were frozen. If Veronica were a little less busy, she might linger to look upon the sight. However, Veronica’s mother was sick, not with the plague, never suggest that, but she was sick and with the servants fled all the work had fallen to Veronica.

At least she had money. She was a famous poet and a whore, but there was little food to buy at the market and what was there would be very dear. It was better than Rome. Veronica had just returned from the Eternal city on the heels of another riot that seemed determined to burn the place down.

Home was better. No riots here. Hardly anyone to riot. The market was almost empty. Hardly anything to buy. She bought two turnips and an eel. She paid too much. As much as a man would pay for an evening of her time. She eyed the eel ruefully, but she had no time to linger.

The snow was getting heavier and she had to struggle against the wind from the sea, taking shelter between buildings.

She hardly understood as she saw a bird fall from the sky. Frozen in the wind. It might be sick, but Veronica was hungry, so she put it in her basket with the eel and walked on.

She stumbled in a snow drift and she screamed. She’d tripped over a man’s leg. The dead man stared at her with frozen eyes. She knew him, but she pretended that she didn’t.

Veronica ran to her home. Forgot dignity and tired and hungry as she ran. Those things would be waiting for Veronica when she arrived at her cold front door where the fire had died and her mother lay coughing weakly in the bed. The servants had all run away. The city was almost empty. Safe enough. Not like Rome.

As the brown snow fell down outside her boarded windows, Veronica pretended that tomorrow the sun would come out.


	35. Henri --- London --- Late

Henri blinked his eyes at the dark. Itz had done a good job with the knots. The ties around his wrists were placed not to hurt when he pulled.

He moved his right wrist. Pushed the small knife in his sleeve until he could reach it with his fingers.

Itz had given him that knife. Told him how to use it. She must have been very worried if she’d forgotten about it.

Henri didn’t like to think about what could worry Itz that much. Didn’t like to think about what could be there in the dark with him, while Itz wasn’t there to eat the bad things. Somewhere, he heard a shutter banging open and shut.

Thought about the feel of the knife in his hand. The sound of cutting through fabric.

Flexed his hand and cut his other hand free. Untied his feet. Quickly struck a taper and lit the candle by his bed.

The dark was only his room. No monsters. Not even the one he wanted.

He got up. Climbed down the stairs. But there was no one there. He was alone, and Itz needed his help. He knew it.

He wrestled the front door open. It was sleeting outside, and his heart was pounding.

But he went out the door. At first he crept from house to house, but soon he was running down the streets to the place where Itz would be.


	36. Two --- Jane --- Portsmouth --- PlaytimeTwo --- Jane --- Portsmouth --- Playtime

Jane held her wooden doll on top of the rock and had her look at the pile of twigs below. Her doll had a tuft of reddish brown wool stuck to its head. Jane's hair was red, too. Her brother, Michael, had given her the doll, before he’d fought with father and gone away. She loved it better than anything.

Her doll's name was Queenlizbeth. Jane turned Queenlizbeth right and then left. Then she had Queenlizbeth jump on the sticks. "Ahhhh-hee!" Jane whispered. 

Queenlizbeth was quickly triumphant over the sticks that had been attacking the village of Rock Pile. Jane muttered Queenlizbeth's story as she walked Queenlizbeth back to the village where several nut shells, the villagers, came out to thank Queenlizbeth. 

She wished her brother were here. Though, she knew if he were really here, he wouldn’t want to play with her. He’d be at the pub getting drunk with the sailors. But still, she wished he’d come back.

Jane's fingers were very cold, peeking out of her mittens, but she had the morning off from her duties in father’s shop. It was the Sabbath and today everyone got to rest.

Next came the great feast prepared by the nut shells, a delicious mud pie. At the great feast prepared by the nut shells, an old woman, a particularly old and warped shell, told the legend of the Red Dragon, and how it wasn’t dead after all, just sleeping, and how a little girl with red hair would one day be picked as the next Hunter of the Cymru and the little girl would be best of friends with Queenlizbeth, because they were both Hunters and they would fight ogres together. Really, really big ogres, and then they'd be like sisters, and go find where Michael had gone in Lunnontown, and everything would be wonderful.


	37. Three --- Kalala Ilunga --- Luba --- Year of the Red Rain

Ilunga was a mighty Hunter in the way that his people reckoned such things. Killed buffalo and antelope and tyrants too in his time. 

He could look at the ground and see the story that the tracks had to tell. Could feel the wind behind his ears and know what it would tell what he hunted. What it wouldn't tell when it blew good and strong in his face.

Didn't take a mighty Hunter to see that the land was dying.

River run red was clear enough. Animals lying dead by the river seemed clear enough too. Ilunga knelt down close to the water and sniffed. Pulled back quick enough. Foul. Like rotten eggs.

Somewhere upriver it was raining something terrible, and the river swelled red along its bank. Or something bubbled up horrible. Same thing.

Ilunga looked up at the clouds running angry in the sky. Hadn't rained here for months. Just clear blue sky and then do-nothing clouds. Better that not it rain at all, if what was going to come down was water that burned at your nose when you smelled it.

Ilunga wasn't a memory man to know what happened in this year or that. Didn't take a memory man to understand what the empty village on the river banks meant. 

Ilunga put his magic iron marble on the tip of his iron hammer. Watched where the marble rolled. Didn’t speak. Nothing much to say. Best to conserve water. 

He led his people out into the nothing good brown dead grass in the direction that the marble had rolled. Away from the dead river and into the West.


	38. One --- Basilisk --- Journeys Start

The heart of a king should be heavy at leaving his people. But the Basilisk’s heart was too happy to be heavy. The sun was shining and the sky was blue and the storm had lifted and the Good Knight was nearby.

Basilikos skipped several steps before he thought that perhaps that this was not kingly behavior. But then true kings did not worry about that sort of thing, so he skipped up the hill and into the valley below. His pack goat carrying his book and a bottle of milk gamboled behind him. It was a good start to a journey.

As he came up the far side of the valley, he came to a place where a great battle had been fought here. Many of the creatures had been killed. Basilikos stood in the foot prints of the Good Knight and felt like singing. But he did not because he had no wish to kill any birds. It was good for a king to know his limitations.

Basilikos’ tongued flickered into the dirt of the footprint. Tasted a drop of the Good Knight’s blood. There was something wrong. Basilikos knew this must be the reason that the Good Knight had never returned to Basilikos’ village. Something was very wrong. Basilikos curled up in the footprint and sighed. He wished he’d known sooner.

His pack goat ate some grass next to the mound of dead creatures. They smelled bad. Like apples. Basilikos wished he’d been there to help kill them dead.


	39. Four --- Betsy --- Darkness under the Deep

It was dark, but Betsy kept swimming downstream. Reaching out with her fingers to avoid the rocks.

Betsy rubbed her round belly. Felt her baby in there. Avoided touching the healing wound where the air breather had stabbed her before taking away the stone that was making them become. She wasn't sure what. Her head was muddled. That wasn't good. She needed a clear head. She was going to be a mama. 

She needed to become. 

Ned nuzzled against her and tried to speak again, but it was all wrong. The words were squeaks. She couldn't understand him. Couldn't understand any of them. Swimming in the dark. 

Betsy had a little one to think of. Her baby wasn't going to born in a cave. Her baby was going to be born in the wide sweet sea. She could taste the salt in her mouth. Hear the tides in her veins. So, she followed the current down the tunnels through the rock. Didn't know where she was going. Felt like she was going home.

The current got faster. Betsy was careful though. Stretched out one hand. Stretched out the wide webbing between her fingers. Felt the way carefully. The other arm protecting her baby. Ned's wide webbed fingers brushed against her. Feeling their baby. 

Brushed along her neck and face. Found her lips. Then he pushed a little wriggling fish against her mouth. He was a good provider, her Ned. She ate it quickly. It tasted good.

The channel was heading up now. Betsy went careful though. Always careful.

She could hear something calling her. She had to get to the sound of the call. Swam up the tunnel and into the light.

Salt water washed over the gills on her sides. It felt good. Right. 

She could see Ned now. He looked so different. Green and bald. Suppose she looked different too. She swam towards the sound. 

Someone was singing. She could almost understand the words.

There was a mer-matron waiting among the rocks. 

The mer-matron was trilling. She gave something to Betsy. A long dark sliver of black stone. Betsy touched it. Felt the ridges and whirls under her fingers. Something inside her fell into place. Ned and the others crowded around her. Brushing the stone with their fingers. It was singing. 

Telling Betsy what they needed to do. How to help finish becoming.

Betsy thanked the mer-matron. Her words didn't mean anything yet, but they would. Soon.


	40. Three --- Vienna, Austrian Empire --- Battle of Vienna

Charles coughed at the biting cold. He stood in the highest point of the city, the tower of St. Stephen's. 

Below, his army huddled within earthen worked city walls, while Suleiman flung cannon fire.

At night, Charles had set his vampires into the camp of the Turk bearing alchemists brew. The night had bloomed red as the tents of the Turk burned. 

Now the fires were out, his vampires impaled on spikes, and the battle raged on. The fields around the city piled with bodies and swarming with black butterflies that fluttered west.

Charles coughed and turned to his secretary. He said, "These spirits are like the little pills my medico bids me swallow to restore heat to my humors."

His secretary nodded weakly.

For below the tower, two armies grappled beneath the earth. Shoving pikes and hammers and spades, into the earth, into each other in the dark. 

While soldiers died unseen, Suleiman sat on a hill with his daughter, Mihrimar, and drank mint tea to still his cough. 

Watched a trickle of his army flood toward the opening in the wall only to be pushed back by soldiers, as the dead piled in the red-brown snow. The air wavering with smoke and the souls of the dead in these the last days of the world. 

Suleiman said to his Grand Vizier, "Again. We will attack three times." 

"My father, why three?" asked Mihrimar. Suleiman glanced at his daughter, holding her infant in her arms.

Suleiman said, "Because it is always three times. Everyone aims at the same meaning, but many are the versions of the story."

So Suleiman sat under a green awning drinking mint tea with his daughter, and Charles stood in the tower of Saint Stephen sipping bitter beer, while below, two armies grappled and died in the dark.


	41. King Felipe --- On the Trail --- November

King Felipe struggled forward. The war drums beat their high sharp calls in the falling snow as everyone walked. Everyone. Even Bishop Gardiner, exhorting everyone to holy thoughts. Even the princes of his court. Even a king.

They walked beside their horses, sheltering from the wind.

As the temperature dropped, the horses’ flesh froze, glittering with ice. Hungry soldiers cut the flesh from the horses’ bellies and ate it raw to keep from dying. So cold, the horses never felt it and walked on.

Even Felipe ate his slice and kept on. According to Alvarado, the weather was better in the north; Felipe fuzzily wondered where Alvarado had gone, but it did not matter. That witch, Elizabeth, had caused a wall of frozen plants to appear at her border, as if that would keep them out.

They were going to push through and fight.

Felipe stared at the falling snow. It had stopped falling. The flakes were suspended in the freezing air. It didn’t matter. In a few days, they would reach the border and the weather would change.


	42. Between Fall and Winterp

Below, the city of Jiangsu spread out like a treasured painting. The five sacred rivers flowed into its center. Monks in saffron robes were streaming from its temples to beg for their food of the day. The farmers were at their distant fields of terraced green. 

He tilted his blue face into the wind and smiled with many sharp teeth. 

He fell from the edge of his home and gave himself to the arms of the thermals. 

He circled out over the city and prepared to descend, when he felt overwhelmed with the cold water of panic in his heart. He spiraled up and high. 

He saw the Earth ripple like a shaken blanket that snapped the buildings like children’s toys. The mighty river Weihe was swallowed in a great crevice of the earth. Geysers spouted sand and water from where the Big Wild Goose Pagoda had been. The cliffs that surrounded the city were now sloping lumps of soft earth in hideous tongues of dirt across the city. 

There was no city. There was not a single building remaining. 

Xian Si circled. He rode high on the wind, and in the distance, he saw only the rubble of villages and cities. Flew low skimming across the earth. He heard only silence. He searched all the day, but found only dead hands reaching from beneath rock and dirt. 

The sun set, but he feared to sleep. He rose into the sky with his brothers and sisters of the sky. 

His brothers told him that the province of Shanxi was no more. His sisters told him that great Xi'an, the place of perpetual peace, had fallen into cracks in the earth. That in every direction, in every province, the story was the same. That there was no counting the dead, for they were without number.

In the morning, he set to doing the only thing he could. Searched for anyone who might have survived. In hope, for the one hand that would move as he touched it, as he pulled strangers back into the light.


	43. One – Valley of Morna --- Waiting

The battle was joined. King Felipe cursed under his breath. The dark sky and soft ground made it difficult for his engineers to aim their cannon. At least if it were snowing, then he'd be able prop the cannons up on boards. But this soft sludge defied Kings and lesser men. 

No matter. They had the superior army. They'd win the North and use its monies to redouble his efforts in the Low Lands. Pinch the French king beneath his fingers, and it all rested on here and now. This moment. This battle. Felipe urged the men on in Obsidian's name.

The battle was going quite well. Cecil stroked his beard and pulled back, forcing King Felipe's forces into tighter and tighter formations. They were almost slipping into each other in the mud stew of the field. Their heavy artillery nearly impossible to aim given the soft sinking soil. Behind him a cannon slammed into the mud. Nearly impossible to aim.

As long as they aimed. 

The field was hot and muggy with smoke.

Cecil prayed for heat. Had the camp followers carrying stoked fires in buckets of eye watering charcoal, and feared it would not be enough.

The feast was laid out on the table. The creature could smell it. After some many tiny meals, finally it had found a battle. 

The creature vibrated with excitement as it ran in the suddenly laughing breezes. It did not understand the words, but it understood the scent of sweat and smoke and fire. They all did. Around it, its siblings ran forward in a wave. Numbered as the sand on the beach. As the stars in the sky. Pulled from their meager appetizers towards the main course. If they didn't hurry, the world would end before they could finish. 

Deep below the dirt, below the stone, the thin crust upon which the world rested shifted and seethed. Trembled from pressure it could hardly hold. 

Amir, who had once been a man, snapped his butterfly wings, and hovered with the others in a swarm of wings high above the battlefield. The enemy was coming. The Voice of the Wind had finally called them. Not some faint half understood, but the Voice. Summoning them to the final task. Summoned them and they remembered their names. Remembering, the souls of the dead gossiped with enemies of that other life. There were no enemies now. Just the call and the task. They hid the sun with their wings and shadowed the valley with their numbers. They watched.

"Wait," the wind whispered as they saw the faint glow over the hill. "Wait," the breeze said as the wave of Angels washed over the ridge and into the valley of men below. "Now," said the boisterous gusts, "Go."

The butterflies floated down. Fell like a blanket of night on each shining shape. The soldiers ran from the valley, but that wasn't important. They weren't the enemy. The Angels were.

Amir cut glowing flesh with his dark wings, and devoured Angels. 

The sun set before they were done. The enemy numbered like stars in the sky. Like sand on a beach. Infinite into the finite and then there were no more.

The butterflies fluttered away on the daring breezes. This was the longest night of the year, and their work had only just begun. They would fly round the world. If only the world would hold together long enough to let them.


	44. After the end of the book

There you go. Fragments left over from Fifth Sun.

So... yeah, there's a tremendous amount of plot, but what it boils down to is this, the world in the story is the Fifth Sun. There have been four previous Sun/worlds. Each was based on a specific founding emotion by one of two Meso American Gods. When previous worlds were destroyed they became (among other things): fish, birds, animals. Thus some of the transformations in the story. They go through a cave into the next world/Sun, and the process starts again. The stone men, etc. are setting things in motion so the way to the next world is opened up.

The Tzitzimime/aliens/Angels are monsters that live beyond the stars and are kept away from the earth (except when cracks open up) by the turning of the celestial spheres. When the world winds down, they are able to come to the earth and feast on the living. Well, the ones who aren't dying in all the various catastrophes. 

The world of the Fifth Sun is supposed to be torn apart in an earthquake, but that still leaves plenty of room for tidal waves, storms, etc.

The obsidian butterflies are the souls of warriors who died in battle. They serve, well myth logically speaking a minor Meso American goddess, but for my purposes I set them to the service of Quetzalcoatl. I wanted a way that everyone on the planet in a way could gather together (previous differences aside) and battle the Tzitzimime so that enough people could survive either saving the world or go to the next world.

Meanwhile there are six central characters alluded to in all these fragments who are either trying to save the world or destroy it. The Good Knight. Itz, an Aztec vampire/priestess. Queen Elizabeth, yes that one. Lucretia, crazy psychic girl. Michael, teenage vampire. Queen Obsidian, who is all mysterious and stuff.

Anywho, someday I'll do something with at least one of these characters. Errr... the ones that you've read in these fragments. Not the six characters I described above, who have their own book and can stay there.

Or not, but now I can stop digging through the 40 or so versions of the novel for fragments.


End file.
